Nagasaki Things to Do

The atomic bomb museum was not exactly fun, but it was quite interesting. Many civilians were killed and the whole tone of the museum is rather guilt inducing.
The Peace Park contains many statues donated from all over the world.

See the Megane-bashi (Spectacles Bridge) by night. Megane-bashi is the oldest stone arch bridge in Japan (1634) and is known as spectacles bridge because its two arches and their refections create an image that looks like a pair of glasses. While still interesting by day, the bridge takes on an otherworldly glow by night - simply enchanting. (unfortunatly, my picture did not come out, so you'll just have to take my word for it).

Nagasaki has been under great influences from the Chinese, Dutch & Portuguese.
Confucian Shrine, Huis ten Bosch & Oura Catholic Church are in this cosmopolitan city. So, it's no surprise that most things here are under much foreign influences as in this boat design.

Chinese Ship Float & Dragon Boat Float.

NAGASAKI MUSEUM OF TRADITIONAL PERFORMING ARTS:
This museum displays the colorful furnishings & floats used in performances during the Kunchi Festival, an autumn celebration with a history of more than 340 years & renowned as one of Japan's 3 major festivals. The building was completed in 1980 for the purpose of preserving Nagasaki's traditional performing arts. A movie on the festival is also shown here.

Nagasaki Kunchi Festival:
Every year from Oct. 7-9, Nagasaki comes alive with the activities of 'Kunchi', a festival devoted to the deities of Suwa Shinto Shrine.
Local neighborhoods 'odoricho' take turns presenting special dances, floats & other performances. Many of these, such as the Dragon Dance, Dutch Ship & Hollander Manzai Dance, vividly reflect Nagasaki's colorful history.
Each performance is preceded by the presentation of a richly decorated 'kasaboko', which evokes the unique characteristics of each neighborhood.

MATSURI: Meaning both festival & worship. The Japanese worships kami (deities) due to their religion Shinto. The Shinto concept is that kami presides over all things, be they living, dead or inanimate.
Matsuri are a link between the human & the divine, usually marking the stages in planting & harvesting of rice. To preserve the goodwill of the deities, matsuri are celebrated with some form of purification (either by water or fire) & offerings. A procession will follow in which the kami is invoked at the shrine & escorted in a mikoshi (portable shrine) to a place of celebration & subsequently back to the shrine.

Kasaboko.

Huis Ten Bosch has a lot of places to visit and its theme is environmental protection. So you can find several activities which conveys this kind of message like Sail Universe where you can take a sky ride inside the tiny universe, Theater of Noah : Ecologia where you can be told how wonderful the machinism of the nature is, also the Horizon Adventure where you can sit still and feels the power or tide and rainstorm, Last but not least, the Great Voyage Theater where you can experience with the Voyage team how they can overcome the wave and storm and discover their dreamland... Make sure you've got a whole day for more of these...

I took this photo from the sea of an island temple.